Night Owls Read Free

boot.
    Crap. He was definitely checking me out. What should I do? Earth to Beatrix: This was the night bus, not a Journey song. Two strangers were not on a midnight train going anywhere. I was going
home, and he was probably going to knock over a liquor store.
    When it came to romance, sometimes I was convinced I was cursed. Don’t get me wrong: I’m not one of those “woe is me, I’m so plain Jane, no boys will ever look my
way” kind of girls. Boys looked (like now). A few even stared (seriously, like
right
now). It was just when they got to know me—or saw my oddball medical artwork—that
things usually went south.
    Too weird for jocks, and not weird enough for hipsters, I was neither freak nor geek, and that left me stranded in no-man’s-land. I was fine being a misfit—really, I was, even when
someone scribbled “Morticia Adams” on my locker with a Sharpie this winter. I mean, first of all, even though we sort of share a last name, Morticia’s is spelled with two
D
s, and I doubt whoever defaced my locked had the brain capacity to know the difference, but whatever. And second, I actually look more like the Addams daughter, Wednesday—the
apathetic girl with the headless dolls—than Morticia, mostly because of my hair. I always braid it, and I know a thousand and one quirky styles, from Princess Leia buns to Swiss Miss to Greek
Goddess, or tonight’s masterpiece: Modern Medieval Princess.
    But the funny thing is, I actually like
The Addams Family
, so whoever christened me with that nickname wasn’t really crushing my feelings. I definitely didn’t lose sleep
over it. And it’s not like I’m completely socially inept, either. I have a couple of friends (and by “a couple” I mean exactly two, Lauren and Kayla, both of whom were
spending the summer together in a warmer part of the state). And I’ve had a couple of boyfriends (and by “a couple” I mean I dated Howard Hooper for two months, and Dylan Norton
for two hours during an anti-prom party in Lauren’s basement).
    So, okay. My calendar wasn’t exactly full, and I could never wear black dresses at school without people snickering behind my back, asking me where Gomez was. But I figured I could ditch
all that in college, where I could reinvent myself as a sophisticated art student, bursting with wit and untapped joie de vivre. My limitless conversation starters about skin and bones would seduce
the heart of some roguish professor (who almost always had a British accent and was also a former Olympic-trained swimmer—but only for the body), and we would run away together to some warm
and fabulous Mediterranean island, where I would become the most celebrated medical illustrator in the world.
    In this daydream, I was always older and more clever, and it was always sunny. But here I was, on a cool, foggy night, sitting on an Owl bus feeling . . . I don’t know. Feeling like maybe
I didn’t need to wait through senior year to make it to some fantasy island on the other side of high school.
    Maybe I could seduce a dangerously good-looking boy on a bus right now.
    His gaze lifted and met mine. We stared at each other.
    And stared.
    And stared . . .
    A strange heat sparked inside my chest and spread over my skin. It must’ve been contagious, because two pink spots stained his cheeks, and I’d never seen a boy like him blush. I
didn’t know what was happening between us, but I honestly wouldn’t have been surprised if the Owl had burst into flames, veered off the road, and exploded in a fiery inferno.
    Bus stops came and went, and we didn’t stop staring. The older, wittier me was one second away from leaping across the aisle and throwing myself at him, but the real me was too sensible.
He finally broke the silence and said in a soft, desperate voice, “What’s your name?”
    The woman with the umbrella made a low noise. She gave me a disapproving frown that put my mother’s to shame. Had she been watching us the whole